Special report

Fifty years after Ernesto Miranda signed his now-infamous confession in the Phoenix jail, the police museum in the same building is opening a permanent exhibit dedicated to the case.

The detective who obtained the original confession from Miranda, Carroll Cooley, was present at the public opening of the exhibit Wednesday to speak with visitors about what he believes to be a widely misunderstood case.

In the half-century since Cooley’s involvement in the case officially ended, he has been contacted by many news outlets and cited in books, articles and even a History Channel show.

Cooley doesn't mind telling people what happened and clearing up the "misconceptions" he sees in many accounts. He believes certain versions of the story cast Phoenix Police in a bad light, claiming the department mistreated suspects.

"That didn't sit well with me, because I knew the facts," Cooley said.

The facts, as Cooley related them, began on March 3, 1963 when an 18-year-old girl called the Phoenix police to report that she had been kidnapped and raped. But as days went by, detectives were looking down a dead-end road. They had no leads and no clues.

A week later, a relative met the girl at her bus stop at a little past midnight to walk her home after work. The two noticed something strange--a car was slowly circling around the neighborhood. They must have been on high alert, as the relative called police to report the license plate of the car, Cooley said.

It seemed far-fetched, but police checked out the license plate. The car was located at an address in Mesa and the detectives determined it was impossible that the plate number was correct. It seemed like just another dead end.

The detectives decided to run another, expanded, search, looking only for Packards with plate numbers that started with "DLF." They located a car that matched the description, but the car was registered to a woman, and she had just moved. A check at the post office revealed a change of address to Mariposa Street.

At that address also lived a man named Ernesto Miranda.

"This is really important, because this is where it gets sticky," said Carroll Cooley. Cooley was the detective who went to Miranda's home that day to investigate.

After a criminal record check, Cooley noticed Miranda had served time for attempted rape and other charges.

After Cooley and his partner arrived at Miranda's home, Miranda voluntarily accompanied the officers to the station, Cooley said. He was free to leave and not in custody.

At this point, Cooley said Miranda was a "person of interest" in the case.

Cooley brought the girl to the station and she picked Miranda from the lineup. A victim of an armed robbery from November 1962 also identified Miranda as the perpetrator in that case.

When Cooley returned to the interview room, Miranda asked Cooley how the lineup had gone, and Cooley said he told him, "Ernie, you didn't do so well."

It was at this point that legal history was made. Miranda confessed to the kidnapping and rape, and handwrote and signed his now infamous confession under a heading that read the statement had been made "voluntarily," and with "full knowledge of my legal rights."

Cooley said this fulfilled the legal requirements of the time. But Miranda would later claim he did not in fact know his rights, despite signing below the heading. When Miranda's lawyers took the case to the Arizona Supreme Court, Cooley was no longer following the case.

"I had no interest in this besides going to court, getting the conviction and moving on with my business," Cooley said.

Museum curator Mike Nikolin, a retired lieutenant with the Phoenix Police, said the Phoenix department in the 1960s never mistreated suspects. Nonetheless, the 1966 Supreme Court ruling that every suspect must be audibly read his rights by the officer helped unify law enforcement methods across the nation.

"We're a big country," Nikolin said. "Phoenix was good about it, but that doesn't mean everyone was."

The downside of the law, and the publicity it generated, meant that suspects simply stopped talking to police and conviction rates nationwide dropped sharply after 1966, Cooley said. Cooley served in the Phoenix Police in various positions from 1958 to 1978.

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